just bought a acorn kamodo grill the paperwork said to use fire starters to light the fire. it took 3 of these to get my first fire going. does that sound right or is there another way to light the charcoal any help would be apprechated

Last edited by timbarber84 on Wed Jun 11, 2014 3:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Were the coals in a chimney or just a loose pile? Was the bottom vent fully open?

I use a chimney and for lighting I set it on the cooking grate of a crummy little Smokey Joe clone I have, and then when the charcoal's fully lit I pour it into the grill I'm actually going to use. One starter cube's all I've ever needed.

I believe that you are missing the point -use a chimney. Trying to start a BBQ charcoal fire without a chimney is very inefficient, both in time and starters. The old method of pilling up the charcoal in the grill only worked with the liquid fire starters which leave a residue which affects the taste of the smoke. And if you ever use the 'Minion' method where you use a layer of un-fired charcoal as a bottom layer which is slowly started by fired charcoals above or beside them, you STILL use a chimney to start the fired charcoals. The use of a chimney is essential for charcoal BBQ.

Never used a chimney to start either one of my kamado style grills and doubt I ever will. If you do use the paper towel method, what I like to do is twist it up and then drip a bit of oil onto it until it is saturated. Arrange the towel in a ring (or almost touching horse shoe shape) on top of the charcoal (maybe digging a bit of a depression in the coal first). Then put a big chunk of lump in the middle of the ring. Build a sorta pyramid over the paper towel using the big chunk in the middle as the apex. Light both ends of the towel and let 'er rip. Let the paper towel burn most of the way around before closing the lid.

Or just get a weed burner and go to town. Much quicker and less messy.

"...Never used a chimney to start either one of my kamado style grills and doubt I ever will..."

Please, explain your antipathy towards the use of a chimney. After I tried many methods including yours, there was no comparison in time to charcoal readiness, convenience and uniform grey coat using a chimney - and it's clean. Why not?

donald just the way a kamodo is made makes it diffacult to get a chimney starter into it its not like a weber where you have plenty of room in my mind by the time you get the chimney inside the grill and dump your charcoal you could get a bad burn. i use a chimney with my chargeriller woth side fire box the kamodo isent the same

O.K. I understand your situation. I have the same situation with my small but versatile Cobb Grill - no convenient place to put the chimney except on the BBQing surface, which I will not do. What I came up with was to buy a backpackers Stainless Steel dinner plate which goes between grill surface and the chimney resulting in a convenient location to fill, ignite with fire starter material, get a fast 20 min. burn time for an even grey coat on the briquettes, and all with no grill surface contamination or residue causing after taste. Highly recommended.

"...Never used a chimney to start either one of my kamado style grills and doubt I ever will..."

Please, explain your antipathy towards the use of a chimney. After I tried many methods including yours, there was no comparison in time to charcoal readiness, convenience and uniform grey coat using a chimney - and it's clean. Why not?

I got rid of my chimney years before I even got a kamado. Never did think the chimneys were all that they were hyped up to be and I've used many different brands, some better than others. I started lighting my offset with a propane torch and can get it going in less than 2 minutes. Beats finding newspaper or papertowels, sprtizing them with oil, lighting them, wait for them to light the charcoal in the chimney (not to mention all the ash left over from the newspaper), then finding my welder gloves to grab the chimney and dump it in. Now, I just grab the torch which is next to the grill, light it, hit the lump in a few places for about 30 seconds each and done. How long to hit the lump with a torch depends on if I am going low and slow or nuclear for a quick sear (that would be on the kamado, not the offset). That takes a bit longer. Maybe 3 mintues tops and up to 700 easy peasy.

Of course, the con of my method is you can't grab a cold beverage and sit down and wait. And wait. And wait for the chimney to be ready to dump into the grill.